125 15 8
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12553
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‘Your writing is terrible,’ she said triumphantly, and there was silence. I wanted to say, no Tara, that’s too much, he needs this – working terrible jobs for years, forever, always feeling the discrepancy between his middle-class childhood and his hand-
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12400
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It's been nearly a full week since getting rid of our cable. As my lady put it, "It feels good not to be connected to the social unconscious." Do I feel like less of a programmed drone? Only to a certain extent.
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12497
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There were so many suicide choices it seemed overwhelming. The chief criteria was the least pain.
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121178
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Here's how it works. The clock in my therapy office ticks off the minutes I get to spend talking with each patient, forty-five in and out, regardless of the amount of distress. Less distress has the option of being shoved out earlier but…
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1211211
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I am Gloria, age nine, standing with my left hand on the green gate to the yard of the farmhouse that I will always consider Home
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120125
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The vet sat with a young woman and old man on a bench in the waiting area. The vet talked like a machine-gun, giving post-surgical instructions for the care of a dog as the woman petted the back of her father who was trembling like…
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11921
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On my way to the creative writing class the next week, I decided that, despite the canonical immortalization of ‘Virginia’ the nineteen-year-old nymph, I didn’t like his story. What was I going to say? Did he expect me to fuck him now? My hands grew sweat
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1181410
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Celia was born with another baby's head atop her head and everyone in the village thought her cursed. It was because Celia's mother had been too young to be intimate with a man, twelve only, and the man, important in the village,…
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118126
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118107
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We should put him out of his misery.
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117106
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A writer was looking for characters for a new story and decided to rent out a room in his brain, thinking it might attract someone interesting. Given the poor real estate market, there were no takers, and he decided to offer the room for…
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117118
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11776
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11584
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Women have been mean to women since Biblical times, Sarah and Hagar vying for Abraham's loyalty, to the Archie comics with best friend rivals Betty and Veronica. Usually the conflict is over a man, but it could be merely envy or a…
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11551
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Larry’s unwashed hands held a cardboard sign. Two largely printed words that would, every now and then, elicit a thumbs up. “Got Pot?” was the only question he really wanted an answer to.
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11552
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When you sit long enoughthe low-lying scrubbegin to swaynot with the windbut of their own volition.It takes timefor them to trust youWhen you sit long enoughthe tree top brancheswelcome waves of fogand gently pushthe mist inland.It takes timefor the cloud-tide to rise.When…
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11577
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The High Priest Psychiatrist at Orwellian Industries Medical Center where I used to work loved to hear himself say the following, to my horror, at every staff meeting: "We psychiatrists prescribe the poisons to the patients and the…
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115157
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11487
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I would like to credit St. Mary's and St. Joseph's for my decision to become a Buddhist nun. The day after I sacrificed my virginity to Johnny Delaney, St. Joseph's star quarterback, he dumped me for Fiona Kelly. That's when I decided to…
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111205
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11121
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A blue oil lamp on the piano behind a screen where Hedda Gabler shoots herself in that last scene.The audience hears, but cannot see, the gunshot. An elderly man —— new to the play and totally caught up in the story —— audily gasps, "Oh my…
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11173
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11093
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She was seeing a new psychiatrist because her old one had died and she resented having to see any psychiatrists at all but needed medication for depression. This one was blonde, blue-eyed with a Russian accent. From the way…
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10800
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and so you waits for years, and he decides that all he needs to learn, he can learn from this woman, the contents of her ether being syrupy and more lush in his mouth than all the words of bound philosophy.
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108195
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Obesity in America is now considered a felony, thanks to Michelle Obama's biceps and weight obsession. They've sent me to couch potato prison where I'm doing hard time in a dark corner of an unfinished basement filled with cobwebs that…
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10833
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Friday night, 80s halcyon,a memory of October bowling.The suburban lanes loudwith kids and kinetic releaseof balls slamming on maple.I have no footwork, no senseof release, fingers sweatyin the grips, resin droppingwith a hollow boomfollowed by derision from more adept…
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107117
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10674
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Moral Dilemmas at Harvard
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106148
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